″‘I’ll do better, Mary. I swear I will.’
Mary didn’t answer. She just looked at Father. Her eyes were sad as Granny’s used to be. Nat knew what she was thinking. ‘You’ve lost your last anchor to windward.‘”
“It means the right to have our own opinions. Human problems aren’t like mathematics, Nat. Every problem doesn’t have just one answer; sometimes you get several answers—and you don’t know which is the right one.”
“And now you’re becalmed. Just like I was at your age. Wouldn’t think to look at me I was bright as a dollar once, would you? But I was. Wanted to make something of myself. But I didn’t have a chance. Taken out of school, I was. Just like you.”